A Little IED, a Big Shock

The Royal Army soldiers hesitated. After all, no one knew what dangers still lurked behind the doors.

"There's no one alive inside."

The mage apprentice behind them spoke again, impatience creeping into his voice.

Only then did the soldiers cautiously step forward to open the doors.

Even so, the mage apprentice quietly cast Mage Armor on himself. A nearly invisible aura of magic enveloped his body.

Three soldiers approached the three doors. They exchanged glances, then shoved them open at the same time.

This time, the expected explosion did not come.

Everyone drew a sharp breath at the sight inside.

In each of the rooms to the left and right, an officer's corpse lay in a pool of blood, both horribly mangled.

In the largest room, the one in the middle, two bodies were tangled together in an extremely indecent position. One of them was Lieutenant Colonel Juan, the man they had come to find.

"Something's happened! Go report to the general!" an officer roared at a soldier beside him.

The soldier obeyed and scrambled down the stairs.

After carefully checking the other parts of the rooms, the mage apprentice and the remaining soldiers entered the middle room.

The air reeked of blood, alcohol, and some sort of cologne, a mixture that turned their stomachs.

"Separate them."

The mage apprentice, who seemed to be a neat freak, pinched his nose and gave the order in disgust.

The officer nodded to the others. Two soldiers stepped forward and struggled to pull Juan's corpse away from the other officer's.

As they tugged and were about to separate the stiff bodies, they felt what seemed to be a thin wire snap.

A rapid series of hisses followed, though none of them could tell what was making the sound.

When the bodies finally came apart, seven round lumps of iron slipped from between them and clattered across the floor.

Everyone in the room stared wide-eyed.

The young mage apprentice's face drained of color. Only one thought remained in his mind.

Run!

But it was too late.

BOOM!!!

When the second, far more violent explosion erupted, High Instructor Eldridge and Astra, commander of the 24th Division, had just arrived outside the building. They watched fire and thick smoke burst from the second-floor windows.

The blast shattered every window in the room. The Royal Army soldiers and the apprentice's attendant were all dead. Only the mage apprentice still showed signs of life.

Thanks to his Mage Armor, the unfortunate apprentice had not died on the spot.

If Morin had known, he would have lamented that a mere fifty grams of rifle powder in each grenade had been far too conservative.

He would have regretted even more that he hadn't left all his remaining grenades behind.

But although the mage apprentice had survived the initial blast, he was hardly in good shape.

Countless fragments from the seven grenades exploding at once had easily overwhelmed his first-circle spell's defenses.

The shock wave hurled him through the air like a ragged sack. Shrapnel riddled his body, and he slammed into the wall and lost consciousness. He was plainly at death's door.

Seeing the High Instructor beside him looking ready to explode with rage, General Sanjurjo felt a chill run down his back.

He cared little about losing a few thuggish officers under his command. The vacancies might even attract others willing to "buy" their posts.

But the death of a mage from the Holy Britannian Empire's Highland Mage Corps—even a mere apprentice—would not be so easily dealt with!

"Lock down the entire city! Search every house! Arrest anyone suspicious!"

General Sanjurjo all but roared the order.

All he wanted now was to catch the killer quickly and give the furious Britannians an answer.

The order set every Royal Army unit in Seville in motion. They focused all their attention on hunting "suspicious people" inside the city.

That, in turn, made the escape of Morin's group, along with the three girls and their families, smoother and safer than ever.

By the time Morin led his dusty reconnaissance squad back to the 33rd Infantry Regiment's 1st Battalion temporary camp, dusk was falling.

They did not even stop for a drink of water before hurrying to Battalion Headquarters.

Major Thomas, the battalion commander, was studying a map with the other officers. He breathed a sigh of relief when he saw Morin and the others return safely.

Captain Hauser arrived soon after hearing the news. Seeing Morin, Corporal Baumann, and the others unharmed, he gave each of them a bear hug.

"So how did the reconnaissance go, Second Lieutenant Morin? Did you find any enemy ambushes?"

Major Thomas quickly got down to business and asked the question that mattered most to him.

"Sir, from what we observed along the way, the enemy hasn't set any ambushes. They've pulled all their forces back into Seville!"

Morin paused, then dropped a bombshell. "So we went into Seville."

Battalion Headquarters fell silent.

Major Thomas and Captain Hauser froze and looked at each other. Their faces plainly said, You've got to be fucking kidding me.

I only sent you to scout the surrounding area for ambushes. How the hell did you end up inside their city?

Did you think you were off to a country market?

Major Thomas felt as though he were listening to an absurd tale.

After the morning's battle, Captain Hauser had come to trust Morin, but even he could not help asking doubtfully:

"Second Lieutenant, do you know what you're saying?"

"Sir, of course I do!"

Morin offered no lengthy explanation. He gave a concise report of everything they had seen and encountered: the Royal Army's defenses on the high ground outside the city, the Magic Crystal Cannon, the arrival of the 24th Division and the Britannians, and what had happened to them inside Seville.

By the time he finished, the looks on Thomas's and Hauser's faces were a sight to behold.

It was a made-up story... but a remarkably detailed one.

Just as Major Thomas was about to voice his doubts, Morin took an officer's identification booklet and a silver officer's badge from his pocket and set them on the table.

"These belonged to Lieutenant Colonel Juan de Rivera, commander of the Aragonese Army's 126th Regiment, 1st Battalion."

Then he took a finely crafted revolver from Corporal Baumann and laid it on the table as well.

"This was his service revolver."

The two items silenced every doubt in Battalion Headquarters.

Major Thomas picked up the blood-scented identification booklet and opened it.

Then he lifted the heavy revolver. It was a Britannian officer's sidearm, supplied to the Aragonese Army as part of a weapons aid package.

All his doubts vanished in an instant.

He looked up and studied the young second lieutenant again, realizing that he might never have truly known him.